not today
by E. Rayne
Summary: She knows that Etro is not unkind. She understands her sacrifice, but she, and she can not speak for any of the ones before her, but *this* her sits across from him at dinner and prays 'not today'.


**a|n :  
**just a little vignette I wrote last night because I was overwhelmed with feelings after my roommates beat XIII-2 finally and I cried through the last 20 minutes of it like I hadn't already seen everything happen a million times. (There's something about Hope's little "But why?" in the end scene that just wrecks my entire life.) I started out intending to write about Caius…but I ended up writing about Yeul ^^; I was thinking about 200AF Yeul (the Yeul who liked flowers) and had an image of her pressing them and Caius helping her and if I could draw I would have done that instead but I can't so this was born.

* * *

_not today._

Even though she knows that she will die, she is never prepared for it. Even though she knows it is pointless to do so, every time she wishes that just this once she could have more time. A little part of her resents the fact that she doesn't, but that passes and she understands why it has to be this way. She holds Caius' hand and she dies in his arms with a reassuring smile. He doesn't cry anymore, but she knows the pain that his grief causes him. She sees it in his eyes every time they are brought together again, feels it in how he holds her much too tightly every time she dies again. The pain in his eyes makes it harder, but it's worse when she dies alone. She is scared and she thinks of how she never got to say goodbye. She thinks of how much more pain will come from him returning home to find her already gone. When she dies alone, it hurts.

Each time she is born again she can not think of him until she sees him. Until they are brought together again she lives her life normal save for a feeling of uneasiness that doesn't go away. She feels like half a person and she dreams until she sees him and then she knows. It isn't remembering because she never forgot, but with the power of seeing the future she sees the past, like a part of her mind or her heart or wherever it is where memories are stored she couldn't access before.

She knows that Etro is not unkind. She understands her sacrifice, but she, and she can not speak for any of the ones before her, but _this_ her sits across from him at dinner and prays _**not today**_. She is constantly torn between the part of her that knows it all, that feels the grief of a thousand lives not lived and the part of her that has just seventeen years of history. The part that knows that seventeen is the oldest she has ever been, the part that doesn't know how she knows that. She is half the part that hopes eighteen will come, half the part that knows better.

On days without visions she can forget, for a little while, about being anything more than who she is in that moment.

Caius is sitting on the couch and she kneels across from him at the coffee table and the air around them is peaceful, and quiet. Times like these he is just Caius and she is just Yeul. She gathers all of the new flowers she's picked that day from her basket and lays them on the table, separating them so that they lay side by side like a menagerie of color. Caius looks up curiously as she gets up from the table and crosses the living room to the book case. She removes as many of the thick volumes as she can carry, and when she reaches that limit she adds two more.

Caius is on his feet. He crosses the distance in one long legged stride and takes the entire pile from her. "What are you doing?" he asks, as he turns to lay them on the coffee table, careful not to crush the flowers.

Yeul uses her now free hands to grab three more books. She doesn't answer him until she is back sitting on the floor before the coffee table. "These flowers are so vibrant. I want to press them so I can keep them."

He sits down without a response, but he doesn't pick his book back up. He watches her open one of the books to more than half way over and lay the small flower onto the page. She gently closes the book and sets it to the side. He watches her do this three more times before he too moves to the floor.

She smiles at him and stops what she's doing to watch him. He picks up a daisy and opens a heavy volume so that it is laying flat on the table. He places the flower as carefully as he can onto the page and looks up at Yeul for confirmation. There is a happiness in her clear green eyes that says everything he needs to know. He closes the book and puts it aside, laying it on top of Yeuls.

She and Caius both grab another book and begin the process again. They sit in a warm, comfortable silence and neither Yeul nor Caius think about time. For once Yeul doesn't wish for more time. This time she wishes for more flowers.

* * *

_Constantly guiding despite the cost  
__Hoping against fear when all is lost  
__Pity not my destiny, no  
__My sacrifice is worth this  
__-Yeul's Theme_


End file.
